Outreach

The education and Outreach programme was launched in March, 1995 with a view of implementing two of the four core functions of KIPI namely:

Dissemination of patent information to the public; and;

Promotion of inventive and innovative activities in Kenya.

The general Kenyan public, and in particular the crucial informal sector, is still a long way from understanding the industrial property system let alone how to utilize it for industrial development. Furthermore, the general public is largely unaware of the fact that protection is given for a limited period only, after strict conditions are met and that once the protection ends, the invention becomes available and accessible in the public domain.

For the past 100 or so years, intellectual property has largely been seen as a purely legal and technical matter thus distancing the general public from the subject. As a result there is less understanding of and support for industrial property protection.